{"id":45668,"date":"2020-11-25T11:00:56","date_gmt":"2020-11-25T18:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.boisestate.edu\/ibo\/?p=45668"},"modified":"2026-08-21T18:35:36","modified_gmt":"2026-08-22T00:35:36","slug":"migratory-mysteries-from-the-west-central-mountains","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.boisestate.edu\/ibo\/2020\/11\/25\/migratory-mysteries-from-the-west-central-mountains\/","title":{"rendered":"New Migratory Mysteries Revealed: Tracking Curlews From the West Central Mountains\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By: Heather Hayes<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you have spent time in higher elevations of the West Central Mountains, then you already know they are comprised of beautiful pristine forests, untamed rivers and incredible breath-taking views from each turn of the canyon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But did you know these mountains are also home to a breeding population of Long-billed Curlews?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strange as it may seem, North America\u2019s largest shorebird<\/a> can be found nesting throughout the sweeping grasslands and mountain meadow pastures that stretch across the valley landscape!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"a
Female Long-billed curlew in Indian Valley, Idaho. Photo Credit: Heather Hayes<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Thanks to an amazing partnership with the Payette Children\u2019s Forest <\/a> and collaborations with multiple ranch owners, we were able to expand our research of Idaho\u2019s iconic grassland species into the mountain communities of Valley, Adams and Washington Counties. This expansion was an important opportunity to study curlews in areas that do not share the same recreational shooting pressures<\/a> and other human impacts that are occurring within our study sites on the public lands of southwest Idaho.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The field season kicked off in the beginning of April and it wasn\u2019t long before the Curlew Crew had located three pairs of breeding curlews!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two nests were found on a ranch located in Meadows Valley northwest of McCall and the third was on a ranch in Indian Valley. The Meadows valley nests were named \u201cNeil\u201d after the private rancher who allowed us access to his property and \u201cPayette\u201d for the Payette National Forest that borders this valley. The Indian Valley nest was aptly named \u201cDozer<\/a>\u201d because the curlew was found nodding off next to the nest!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Four
Payette’s eggs beginning to hatch in Meadows Valley. The bill is just visible inside the egg! Photo Credit: Heather Hayes<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Once the nest locations had been documented, the team assembled to band and deploy three backpack transmitters that would soon reveal some important questions for our study: Where are these higher elevation curlews overwintering? What routes are they taking to get there? Would they use the public lands of southwest Idaho as a migratory stop-over?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If so, would they fall victim to the recreational shooting pressures?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In just one short month, these migratory mysteries began to unfold, literally before our eyes! While Payette\u2019s nest had been successful, Neil and Dozer\u2019s nests had unfortunately failed due to predation. By tracking the males on our satellite tracking map, we knew they left their West Central Mountain breeding territories and began their southbound migration in mid-June. Dozer (from Indian Valley) passed directly over our initial study area on the public lands known as the Long-billed Curlew Habitat Area of Critical Environmental Concern and Neil (from Meadows Valley) passed directly over the Morley Nelson Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area (NCA) which are the public lands south of Boise. We now had confirmation- these curlews indeed migrated through the recreational shooting \u201cdanger zone\u201d of our other southwest Idaho study sites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now all we could do was hold our breath and wait for their transmitters to send another signal…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"photo
Neil from Meadows Valley (top) and Dozer from Indian Valley (bottom) with their corresponding mid-migration satellite tracking locations after making it through the recreational shooting “danger zone” of southwest Idaho. Photo Credit: Heather Hayes<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A collective sigh of relief came when Dozer\u2019s next transmitter signal ping came from outside Reno, NV, and Neil\u2019s from Modesto, CA. They made it!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the excitement didn\u2019t stop there…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2026and neither did their southbound travels. In a few short days, their final destination was revealed- the Morro Bay area of California.<\/a> These were the first curlews from any of our breeding research study sites to migrate directly to coastal California to overwinter!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"a
Dozer foraging on the beach at Morro Strand State Park on the coast of California. Photo Credit: Petra Clayton<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Payette eventually migrated south and also crossed over the public lands of the NCA safely but did not head to the coast. She settled into her wintering grounds just south of Fresno California, not far from a curlew from our SW Idaho study flock named Jupiter!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So why are these new research discoveries so important?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As we continue to piece the migratory connectivity puzzle together, we can work toward ensuring conservation measures are in place to protect the habitats and resources curlews need along their migratory routes throughout their entire annual life cycle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Can you help us move forward with exciting new discoveries?<\/strong> You can make a meaningful and valuable impact by donating to our Curlew Satellite Tracking Program on our giving page<\/a>. Be sure to select the Curlew Project from the drop-down menu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spring migration begins in March! Please report any new curlew sightings from these areas on eBird.org<\/a> or email heathermhayes@boisestate.edu. If you would like to check in on where our tracked curlews have settled into on their wintering grounds, be sure to head over to the satellite tracking map\u2013 it\u2019s accessible 24\/7.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is part of our 2020 end of the year newsletter! View the full newsletter here<\/a>, or click \u201colder posts\u201d to read the next article.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Make sure you don\u2019t miss out! Sign up to get our annual email update.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By: Heather Hayes If you have spent time in higher elevations of the West Central…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1689,"featured_media":45647,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2882,2890,262,2889,2883],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-2020-newsletter","category-archive","category-curlews","category-graduate-students","category-newsletter"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nMigratory Mysteries Revealed: Tracking Mountain Curlews<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Strange as it may seem, this migratory shorebird can be found nesting throughout the grasslands and mountain meadow pastures across the valley landscape!\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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